


We'll Get It Together And We'll Get It Undone

by grocketinmypocket



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, Falling In Love, M/M, Rock Star, Roquill - Freeform, Slow Burn, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-22
Updated: 2014-10-07
Packaged: 2018-02-18 09:07:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2342903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grocketinmypocket/pseuds/grocketinmypocket
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rocket knew next to nothing about human children, except that he needed to stay away from the littlest ones because they liked to pull his ears and tail, but he knew immediately that Peter was now very young. Not tail-yanking age, but definitely younger than his teens. Somewhere from eight to about twelve, maybe. There was no mistaking that this was Peter -- the copper-colored hair and bright green eyes were the same, his features still recognizably Peter Quill.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Voted Most Unlikely Babysitter Aboard the Milano

**Author's Note:**

> **BAD NEWS, FOLKS. My fics are officially being abandoned. I'm sorry that I won't be finishing them, but my life has changed a geat deal in the year or so since my fics were written and I no longer have the time to write for fun.**
> 
> This story carries an Explicit rating due to slash between consenting adult Peter and Rocket in later chapters.
> 
> This story was inspired by [a kink meme prompt at Cosmic Kink](http://cosmic-kink.dreamwidth.org/546.html?thread=44066#cmt44066) for a de-aged Peter, with the suggestion that "Peter comments that girls are gross, so he's going to marry Rocket when he grows up." And then this story happened.

In the sudden vacuum of leadership left by _whatever the hell was happening_ , Rocket decided that post-mission debriefings would be a very good idea. It would be very useful to have such information as "got hit by weird beam weapon during battle, shrugged it off, felt sick all evening, went to bed without telling anyone you felt funky." Because then pre-emptive measures like getting checked out by Nova Corps, or having a teammate watch over you, could be employed; not "waking up the entire ship with your terrified screams and then hiding in the tiniest smuggler's bolthole available that you could cram yourself into before anyone else could even get out of their rooms." Unless you were Peter Quill, congenital dumbass, in which case you just fucked off and went to bed and let everybody else deal with whatever the hell was wrong with you later.

The smuggler's compartment Peter had gone to ground in, Rocket realized as he crawled through the hydraulics ducts under the main deck, should have been too small for Peter to get into in the first place. Much too small. He himself was the only one who could even reach, much less occupy, most of the concealed compartments that he and Peter had scattered around the re-built _Milano_ , and which Nova Corps steadfastly pretended they knew nothing about. As he drew closer to Peter's hidey-hole, he began realizing the wrongness of the human scents and sounds he was following. The sounds of sniffling and sobbing were much too high to be Peter's voice, and while the scent was similar, it was lighter, sweeter. As if it was still Peter, but without the thick, musky smell of an adult human male's hormones.

Rocket crawled faster, hearing the breathy, broken sobs clearer now, and his gut churned. It was the most helpless, hopeless sound he had ever encountered, and hearing it come from his friend was making him hope against hope that Peter was all right, somehow, because if he wasn't, Rocket couldn't punch him in the goddamn face for scaring him like this. He reached the entrance to the cubby hole, nestled under the main starboard hydraulics matrix, and sank his claws into the seam around the false wall panel that hid the opening. Yanking it away, he came face to face with Peter, curled up in a little miserable ball in the tiny space beyond.

Peter _himself_ was tiny. Rocket knew next to nothing about human children, except that he needed to stay away from the littlest ones because they liked to pull his ears and tail, but he knew immediately that Peter was now very young. Not tail-yanking age, but definitely younger than his teens. Somewhere from eight to about twelve, maybe. There was no mistaking that this was Peter -- the copper-colored hair and bright green eyes were the same, his features still recognizably Peter Quill. The rest of him was as unfamiliar to Rocket's eyes as he was to Peter's -- the moment Peter saw him, he screamed and shoved himself even further into the compartment, before suddenly stopping his scream mid-breath and staring at Rocket with wonder overtaking the fear.

"Wow," little Peter said, crawling forward out of his hidey-hole. "Can you talk?"

"'Course I can talk. What the hell happened to you, Quill?" Rocket asked, dumbfounded. 

"Hey, that's my name! Do you know me? Do you know where I am?" Peter asked, and Rocket's heart sank. Peter hadn't just been physically reduced to childhood; his adult memories had obviously been taken as well. At least he apparently still had a functioning translator implant, or communicating with him would have been a nightmare. Peter crawled out and squatted down next to Rocket, and Rocket saw he was wearing the Nova Corps t-shirt he'd presumably been sleeping in, now belling around his knees like a dress, one bony little shoulder hanging out of the neck-hole where it hung askew on his tiny frame. Peter reached out and gently petted Rocket between the ears, smiling happily at the feel of his fur, and Rocket knew he was in trouble.

"Hey! I'm not a dog, all right?" He brushed Peter's hand away, but as kindly as he could.

"What are you, then? 'Cause you look like a raccoon," Peter asked, reasonably enough.

"I'm Rocket. I'm a -- I'm your friend." Peter seemed happy enough for the moment, but Rocket knew it wouldn't last. He may not have spent much time around humie children of his own free will, but he knew they were mercurial little monsters who could swerve from happy to hysterical in no time. He needed to get Peter up above-decks before he started panicking again, and hopefully one of the others would, even if they didn't know what to do about this, at least take Peter's care out of his hands, because he was already feeling anxious about getting Peter safely upstairs. He was so small, and thin, and fragile-looking.

"Hey, I know this neat game," he said with fake cheer. "This place is like a maze -- you wanna go exploring?" He hoped Peter would agree without protest, and then he could simply lead him back up to the main decks and hand this mess off to someone more capable. He knew he was out of luck when Peter narrowed his eyes suspiciously.

"I'm not 'sposed to go anywhere with strangers," he said anxiously, looking as if he wanted to crawl back into his hiding space. 

"I'm not a stranger," Rocket said with desperation. If Peter wanted to, he could entrench himself down here and even Rocket would never be able to get him out. The others were too big to fit; they'd have to haul the _Milano_ into drydock and cut their way down into the bowels of the ship. "You're Peter Jason Quill, from Terra -- Earth, I mean," he amended, when Peter looked confused. He wasn't sure how old this version of Peter was, or how old he'd been when Yondu took him, so he took a calculated risk and said, "Your favorite things in the whole galaxy are your walkman and your mixtape. Your favorite song is 'Hooked On A Feeling' by Blue Swede. Your favorite movie is 'Footloose.' You want to be a space pirate when you grow up," he said, and Peter was looking at him with wonder again. "And when you're a grown-up, you're my best friend."

"You _do_ know me!" Peter said, and threw his arms around Rocket, burying his face in Rocket's fur. Rocket put his hands uncertainly on Peter's back, feeling the slats of his ribs and bony planes of his shoulderblades under the thin t-shirt, and hugged him back. "Are you gonna take me home?" Peter asked against the fur of Rocket's neck. "I don't know where I am. My mom -- my mom's gone." Rocket could hear the sniffles starting again, and froze unhappily.

"I know, buddy," he said, patting Peter's back awkwardly, thinking fast. "That's why we're gonna take care of you now, okay?"

"You are?" Peter said, drawing back to look at Rocket.

"Yeah, you can't grow up to be a space pirate on some stupid planet, right?"

"Am I in space?" Peter whispered, face suddenly glowing with excitement.

"You're on a spaceship right now," Rocket said, and Peter whooped with joy.

"I wanna see! I wanna see the stars and all the planets and how you fly it and are there laser cannons and stuff? Are you an alien? Are there other aliens here too? I wanna meet 'em, can I?" Peter was bursting with excitement, and Rocket seized on it, hoping to just _get him upstairs_ where this could be not his problem anymore, as soon as possible.

"Sure, but we gotta get back up to the main deck first," Rocket said, gesturing down the cramped hydraulics shaft he'd crawled down to find Peter. "Just follow me and I'll show you all around the ship, okay?"

"Okay!" Peter said, and when Rocket turned and began to crawl back the way he'd come, Peter crawled after him, chattering at him the entire way, asking more questions than Rocket could ever hope to answer in a rapid-fire barrage. By the time they emerged from the maintenance panel in the cargo bay, Rocket was exhausted from mentally editing his replies to Peter's hundreds of questions in order to give child-safe answers. As he pulled himself from the maintenance shaft, he found Gamora, Groot, and Drax hovering anxiously, bombarding him with questions and _"I am Groot"_ s about Peter before he was even safely on the deck. 

"Back up, you'll scare him!" he hissed at them, as Peter scrambled out and spilled himself onto the deck in a pile of spindly limbs.

"Whoa!" Peter yelped, hovering behind Rocket's shoulder as if Rocket would protect him from the new-comers. "You're really green," he said to Gamora. "And you're really blue. And you're a tree!" he said, craning his head back to look up at Drax and Groot towering over him. "They're really aliens! This is _awesome_!"

"Peter?" Gamora said in shock.

"Do you know me too? Is this where I live now? I get to live in space! Can I see the cockpit? I wanna learn how to fly!" Peter was bouncing with excitement, turning his head this way and that as he looked around the cargo bay. When he spotted the stairwell leading up to the habitation deck, he snatched up Rocket's hand and towed him toward the stairs. "I wanna see everything, you said you'd show me around, Rocket! Let's go!"

Pulled along by the iron-clad, excited grip of a small child, Rocket helplessly stumbled after Peter. "Set a course for Xandar," he told Gamora over his shoulder. "We should take him to Nova Corps, see if they can figure this out."

The others simply stared after them, as Peter dragged Rocket up the stairs, talking a million miles a minute and asking more questions. By the time they caught up and joined little Peter and his unwilling au pair, Peter was standing in the doorway to the cockpit, gaping at the display of stars splashed out across the viewscreen. He dropped Rocket's hand and stepped forward slowly, eyes eating up the view, stopping next to the central seat and just looking, silently.

Gamora and Drax stopped behind Rocket, watching Peter watch the stars. "Does he remember anything?" Gamora asked in a low voice. 

"I don't think so," Rocket replied. "I think, to him, this is right after his mother died."

"What do we do?" Drax asked in a quiet rumble.

"I told him we were takin' care of him now. I didn't know what else to say."

"I will set course for Xandar, as you suggested. Perhaps they will understand what has happened to him," Gamora said. She walked over to Peter and stood at his shoulder for a moment, and then brushed gently past him to sit in the pilot's chair. Peter watched her with interest as she programmed the flight computer and autopilot.

"What's your name?" he asked her shyly, coming to stand next to her seat.

"Gamora," she answered, and Peter smiled sweetly. 

"You're a real pretty green," he said, and Rocket wanted to groan aloud. Of _course_ Peter Quill would still have game to spare for the ladies, even as a small boy.

"Thank you," Gamora said, and Rocket wanted to laugh at the flattered, warm tone of her voice, until he reminded himself that she wasn't the only one charmed by little Peter and his big green eyes and enthusiasm. The moment it had sunk in for Rocket that Peter was, in all respects, a helpless child, he had felt a desire to protect him sweep over himself with ruthless force. He figured that was the whole point to little kids, really. They were deliberately designed to be charming and adorable enough to make you want to keep the little bastards safe. 

"Can I see the rest of the ship, please?" Peter said, turning back toward Rocket. His eyes were big and shining, and Rocket knew it was because he was seeing everything he'd dreamed of seeing, when he'd been an actual child the first time. There'd been something of the pirate in him, even then, Rocket suspected, and he was seeing young Peter's joy at a brand new horizon to throw himself toward, adrift on the seas of space. _I'm so screwed_ , Rocket thought. When Peter walked over to him and grabbed his hand again, he let him, casting a despairing glance back at Drax as Peter dragged him downstairs, already chattering about being in space and did he have a space suit and could he do a spacewalk sometime, that would be so cool!

Drax said nothing, but his eyes were warm and he was smiling, sadness creeping in at the corners. Rocket remembered that he'd had a kid himself, and wondered if that was why he wasn't acting like the only person on board with actual experience with children, and letting Rocket be the designated babysitter. It would be painful, he guessed, to be confronted with another child while you were still grieving your own.

By the time he had shown Peter the common area and galley, he could see Peter's eyes drooping tiredly. Groot had joined them, and was watching Peter closely, probably confused as to why Peter was now a sapling rather than full-grown. _You and me both, pal_ , Rocket thought, feeling ten times as tired as Peter was beginning to look. "Come on, I'll show you your bunk, and you can get some rest."

"I'm not tired," Peter insisted on the tail-end of a yawn. "I wanna see everything!"

"Well, _I'm_ tired, and if I get too tired, I can't show you more cool stuff tomorrow," Rocket replied, hoping that he could indeed come up with something new and cool to keep this little bundle of questions and comments busy until they reached Xandar and hopefully got this reversed.

"You won't leave if I go to sleep?" Peter asked, finally consenting to follow Rocket down to the crew quarters. Rocket remembered that for Peter, he had just lost his mother. Although Rocket couldn't actually sympathize with that specific circumstance, never having known his mother or any family at all, he knew it was something like what he had felt, crawling down the access shaft towards Peter's hiding place, consumed with the fear that he would lose his friend.

"I won't, I promise," he said now, knowing that he was throwing himself into the deep end of the pool, making promises to a scared, lonely little kid. He hoped he would be able to keep them. He opened the door to Peter's quarters and let him enter the room ahead of him. Peter was looking around, goggling at everything.

"My walkman!" Peter cried out, grabbing it up from the table beside the bunk and holding it reverently. "Is this my room?" he asked.

"Yeah," Rocket answered, and when Peter looked up at him, it was with an uneasy, disturbed look on his face.

"It's all old and beat up," he said, glancing down at the walkman in his small hands. "How come? How come I don't remember any of this stuff, or you, if this is where I live now?"

Rocket sighed, knowing it was not possible to avoid Peter's questions. Even as a child, under the laughing, mischevious, easy smile, there was a razor-sharp mind. "Because until just now, you were an adult. This ship, the _Milano_ \-- it belongs to you. We're like -- what is it you always say? -- superheroes. We're called the Guardians of the Galaxy. You're our leader. We got into a fight with some bad guys, and something did this to you, and made you a kid again."

"I'm really a grown-up?" Peter asked, confused. "I'm a superhero?"

Rocket picked up the helmet earpiece from the table, where it had been lying beside Peter's walkman. "Check this out," he said, and clipped the earpiece over Peter's ear, then tapped the trigger lightly and drew his hand back as the helm built itself out of nowhere to cover Peter's face.

Peter turned his head excitedly, feeling the weight of the helmet, and his muffled voice came through the speakers set into the mouthpiece. "This is so wicked!"

"You've got jet boots, too," Rocket added, realizing that Peter's adult tastes in superhero accessories had come straight from the child standing before him right now.

"I wanna try 'em! Can I?" Peter said, voice tinny and shrill with excitement through the helmet. 

Rocket shuddered with horror at the thought of little Peter slamming around the ship with jet boots on. "We'll see, I'd haveta fix 'em for you first," he said, hoping that such a thing would be unneccessary because Nova Corps would know what to do and would restore Peter to normal. He tapped the button on the helmet again, and it folded itself back into the earpiece, which he plucked off Peter's ear and tucked into his own pocket. Knowing Peter, he would wear it constantly if left to his own devices.

"What's my superhero name?" Peter asked.

"Star-Lord," Rocket replied, and Peter's eyes filled with sudden tears.

"That's what my mom calls me," he said. "She said I was just like my daddy. He's an angel, made of light. Do you know him? Are you gonna take me to him?" Peter asked, and Rocket's heart twisted uncomfortably in his chest. He would rather shoot himself in the face with his own railgun than even entertain the thought of giving this kid to anyone else.

"I don't know him, kiddo, and we all want you to stay here with us," he said finally. "This ship is yours, it's your home."

Peter looked at him for a moment, studying Rocket, and then said, "Even if I never get big again?"

"Even if," Rocket said, unwilling to even speak aloud the possibility that Peter might be stuck like this.

Peter yawned suddenly, surprising an answering yawn out of Rocket. "Come on, time for all us superheroes to get some sleep," he said, and pulled back the blankets on Peter's rumpled, unmade bunk. _He was a grown-up when he got into it a few hours ago_ , Rocket thought. _Now look at him_. Peter climbed in without complaining, all heartbreakingly knobby knees and scraped little-boy elbows and the fading shiner around his right eye that had bothered Rocket ever since he had first seen child-Peter. "What happened to your eye?"

"Some of the big kids were killin' frogs at recess," Peter said with disgust. "I tried to stop 'em and they beat me up. Do I stop people from doin' bad stuff, when I'm grown up?" Peter snuggled into the pillow, after scooting over to make room in the bunk for Rocket.

"You saved the whole galaxy a while back," he said, knowing that his intention to sit up and watch over Peter as he slept was pointless now. He climbed into the bunk next to Peter, and Peter immediately wrapped his arms around Rocket and curled up close, clutching him like a stuffed toy.

"I did?" he said softly, amazed.

"You sure did, baby boo," Rocket replied. He didn't understand why the pet names were coming so easily now -- _kiddo, baby boo_ \-- but was too tired to question it.

"Did you help? I bet you did. You said we were best friends."

This kid was going to _kill_ him. He knew nothing about taking care of a child. He was a thug, a thief, a freakish little monster. Peter needed someone, though, and he seemed to have chosen Rocket. "We all did, but it was mostly you." He let himself ramble, telling Peter an edited, safe-for-children version of the dance-off that saved the universe, leaving out Groot's death and his own injuries from crashing a fighter into the _Dark Aster_ , and planning to soften his telling of the four of them holding the stone's power together.

It seemed to do the trick as a bedtime story, and Peter quietly listened, breathing slow and even and tickling against Rocket's fur. Just as Rocket was beginning to think he'd finally fallen asleep, as he was recounting the part about how dopey and befuddled Ronan had looked when Peter started to dance, a little voice spoke sleepily into his ear. "Don't go nowhere, 'kay?"

Rocket sighed, feeling as if he was signing his death warrant. "Not goin' anywhere."

"'Kay," Peter said, and fell asleep. Rocket was asleep not long after, thinking as he passed into a doze that he should be more careful. Not with the stories he told Peter, but with himself. He knew he shouldn't get attached -- hopefully, Peter would be back to his true age soon, if Nova Corps could do anything about it, and he would have to give up this child in favor of full-grown Peter. As much as he liked and admired the man this boy had become, the boy himself was charming, sweet, and completely unreserved in his affection and enthusiasm. He deserved to be protected, and Rocket felt sick as he thought of this little guy being raised by Yondu and the Ravagers. He deserved better, and Rocket resolved that if there was no way to return Peter to adulthood, he would take care of him himself.

The thought was terrifying, but for once, Rocket's dreams held no fear or flashbacks of his time in the labs, and he slept easily, cuddled in Peter's arms like a living teddy bear.


	2. The Fine Art of Spoiling Terran Children

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Rocket," he said finally. "If I get to be big again, will you still like me?"
> 
> "'Course I will, baby boo, I told ya -- you're my best bud."
> 
> Peter was silent for a moment, then said, "I don't remember none of this, on the ship, or bein' a grown-up, but I think I remember you, a little. I remember that I like you a lot," Peter said, shyly. "I remember bein' your friend, I think."

When Rocket woke, it was to an empty bunk, the sound of Groot murmuring, and Peter's soft, delighted giggles. When he opened his eyes, Groot was towering next to the bed, Peter cradled in his branches, and Groot was growing little daisies all over his shoulders for Peter to pluck off. Peter saw that Rocket was awake, and showered him with the handful of flowers he had gathered, leaping down from Groot's embrace and landing on the bed next to Rocket.

"He says his name's Groot! That's all he says, though. He's cool! Is he one of my friends when I'm grown, too?"

"Yep," Rocket said, struggling not only to wake up, but to cram into his head that none of it had been a particularly vivid dream, and that Peter was actually a child. "Me an' him were partners as bounty hunters, that's how ya met him." He decided to leave out the part of the tale where he and Groot had assaulted, electrocuted, and tried to abduct Peter in order to turn him over for the price on his head. Thinking back on their first meeting made him remember adult Peter, and he suddenly missed him intensely. He knew that Peter was right beside him -- hugging him so tightly that Rocket was beginning to lose sensation in his arms, in fact -- but he felt as if Peter was far away somewhere, and would come back. It was a weird doubling sensation, to look at Peter and see the man he would become. He liked that guy, a lot, and hoped he would see him again someday.

For now, he had a kid to take care of, and the idea overwhelmed him.

Peter snuggled against him for a minute longer, then sat up. "You got cereal? I can get it myself, I'm big enough to do it. Before my mom got so sick she had to go to the hospital, I got myself ready for school every day." He looked proud of himself, and confided, "Even after I started stayin' with Grandpa I got my own cereal in the morning, Grandpa can't cook good." His lower lip trembled a little. "I miss him. You think he's okay, Rocket?"

"I'm sure he is, kiddo. Probably misses you, too." He knew he needed to distract Peter now, or he would end up with a bunkful of crying kid. "I dunno if we have cereal. Let's see what I can go scrounge up that don't eat us first," he said, disengaging from Peter's grasp and ruffling his hair as he got up. Peter let him go, and followed him up the stairs to the main level, eyes wide, Groot trailing pleasantly after them.

"Does that happen out here? Stuff tries to eat you?" he asked, awed.

"Sometimes, but usually not at the breakfast table."

Peter's giggle was musical and carefree, and Rocket thought again of grown-up Peter. He wished that he could somehow combine the two -- this child's enthusiastic, all-the-grabby-hands adoration of life, with Peter's humor and sarcasm. He was coming to believe that as far as this Peter knew, he had never encountered the Ravagers, that he had run from his mother's deathbed straight into a bright, searing light and then woken up here, in a strange room, in a strange bed. That was good, as far as Rocket was concerned. He didn't think that Yondu had actually abused Peter in any way, but he also didn't think that growing up on a pirate fleet, threatened with cannibalism regularly, had been good for Peter, now that he was coming to know the child he had been.

 _Like I'm going to be any better_ , he thought with a cold chill. _I don't know what I'm doing._

He found Drax and Gamora already in the galley, and thank holy hell, Drax was the one cooking. Rocket could cook if required, mostly basic, no-frills fare, but Gamora had no aptitude for cooking whatsoever. It was like all her cybernetically-enhanced brain cells were allocated to killing, not keeping anyone alive. Grown-up Peter teased her mercilessly about using the smoke alarm as a kitchen timer. Drax, on the other hand, produced good food, and no one ended up fighting over another burned communal meal.

Peter acted a little reticent as he came into the galley with Rocket, and Rocket felt a little hand creep into his as Peter shied against his side. Peter had been exhausted and unsettled when he met them last night, Rocket realized. He stood on tiptoes to speak into Peter's ear. "The big blue and red guy makin' breakfast is Drax. He's nice, don't let his scary looks fool ya. You met Gamora, remember? She was flyin' the ship when I took you into the cockpit."

Peter pulled himself up and smiled at the other two, as if remembering his politeness belatedly. "Hello sir, ma'am. I guess you know me, huh? Since I'm 'sposed to be a grown-up."

Gamora and Drax both laughed, and Rocket knew Peter had charmed them all over again. "There is no need for formal titles, little Quill. We are all friends here," Drax said, smiling, and brought a platter of o'youu eggs and crusty, soft bread to the galley table. "Please call me Drax."

Peter sat down at the table with Rocket, making sure to pick the seat closest to him. "Momma says I shouldn't call grown-ups by their first name, it's rude."

"I think it is appropriate to make an exception for us," Gamora said, rising to fetch juice from the cold storage. "After all, we are all friends when you are...at full size." Gamora finished, and Rocket knew she was suddenly feeling that same weird doubling, of looking at little Peter and seeing the grown-up Peter as well. "Please call me Gamora."

"Y'all don't have last names?" Peter asked, digging into the plate that Rocket had been building for him. "So I could call you mister or miss. Mom said that was okay." Rocket remembered Peter telling him once about how he was raised with good Southern manners, and he could see that Peter was uncomfortable with the familiarity. 

"How 'bout you call 'em Mr. Drax and Miss Gamora?" Rocket suggested. He realized that Peter had no such reservations about using Rocket's name, and figured it was because he'd met him first, and was a little thrown off by Rocket's non-human form.

"Okay!" Peter agreed happily, and Rocket glanced at Gamora and Drax, who were hiding grins and cutting their eyes at each other in supressed hilarity. He gave them a dirty, quelling look, saying "Don't make him feel bad," with his glance alone, and they both straightened and nodded at him.

Rocket remembered what he'd been meaning to ask Gamora -- "Hey, you got any workout pants or something you don't want? I need to get this kid some pants before he freezes his butt off." Peter was still wearing the t-shirt grown Peter had been sleeping in, and Rocket was maddened by the impulse to straighten the damn neck-hole every time he glanced at Peter, with it hanging off his shoulder like that. His own clothing -- the stuff that wasn't jumpsuits with armored panels, at least -- would be far too small. Even as a child, Peter was taller than him, with Rocket coming up to Peter's shoulder. He thought he remembered seeing a child-sized t-shirt -- the one Peter had been wearing when Yondu abducted him -- somewhere in Peter's quarters once, and decided to look for it later.

"Yes, but they will still be too large," Gamora said.

"Don't worry about it, I got that covered," Rocket replied. "Some socks, too, maybe? Your feet are the closest in size." Peter walking around barefoot on the cold metal decking was worrying him, as well.

"All right. Come to my quarters after we finish eating."

Peter insisted on helping clear the table, and Rocket was bemused to see it from a boy who would grow up to be a man who left food refuse and trash scattered in his wake like a walking disaster. "You never help when you're a grown-up," Rocket said, watching Peter put a stack of plates by the sink.

Peter looked scandalized. "That's bad, I was raised better," he said primly. "Momma says to always help people." He looked sad then, and Rocket knew that, despite how relaxed and happy he seemed, it was only because his new surroundings were keeping him distracted.

"You may not clean up your messes, but you help a lot of people," Rocket said, trying to figure out some way to keep Peter's mind off missing his mother.

"Is that what we're gonna do today? Be superheroes and help people?" Peter put his arms out and sailed around the galley making flying noises, interspersed with ray-gun "pew pew" sounds. Rocket was utterly tickled by it, and sad as well, because he had honestly seen grown-up Peter do the exact same thing, complete with "pew pew" noises.

"Not today, kiddo, we're in deep space, on our way to Xandar," he said, getting up and walking over to Peter as he ran out of steam and stopped 'flying.' "Come on, we gotta get ya some actual clothes."

"Is that a planet? I get to see a real planet?" Peter said, screechy with excitement.

"Uh-huh. The one you saved, with the dancing thing. We're gonna see if they can make you a grown-up again."

Peter looked unsettled. "Rocket," he said finally. "If I get to be big again, will you still like me?"

"'Course I will, baby boo, I told ya -- you're my best bud."

Peter was silent for a moment, then said, "I don't remember none of this, on the ship, or bein' a grown-up, but I think I remember you, a little. I remember that I like you a lot," Peter said, shyly. "I remember bein' your friend, I think."

"Is that why you weren't scared of me?" Rocket asked, taking Peter's hand without thinking about it, to lead him to the crew quarters and Gamora's cabin.

"Uh-huh," Peter said. "That, and I thought you were really neat. You can talk, and you're the smartest one here, and you were real, real nice to me when I was scared. And you're my best friend." Peter hugged him suddenly, startling Rocket, just as they stopped in front of Gamora's quarters. "I never had one before, all the kids at school called me and my momma mean names and picked on me. Thank you for being my friend." Peter hugged him tighter for a moment, then let go.

Rocket had never known that bit of information. He had pictured Peter as a confident, well-loved kid, if he had ever considered what Peter had been like as a child before. It hurt to hear that Terrans were so stupid as to reject this brilliant, funny, dorky little man, and made Rocket more determined to make his second childhood, if that was what Peter would be living, a better and safer one.

"Thanks for bein' mine, too. I never had any friends 'cept Groot, before I met you, and he ain't that great at conversations."

Peter giggled, intoning "I am Groot" in the deepest voice he could muster as Rocket knocked on Gamora's door. When she answered, she handed Rocket a bundle of clothing -- a pair of soft dark-gray workout pants and a stack of socks. "Thanks," he told her, and she smiled and reached out to ruffle Peter's red-blond head.

"I do not wish to see our little Terran child going unclothed," she said seriously, and patted Peter's hair once more before nodding at Rocket and withdrawing into her room, closing the door.

"She's nice," Peter said, "But kinda scary."

"Yeah, kinda," Rocket agreed, and led Peter up to the main deck and his workspace. He had clothes to alter.

=====

Rocket glanced up as Peter slid into view, giggling wildly, his new borrowed socks slipping easily on the metal deck. He had not considered this when he'd put the socks on the damn kid in the first place, and was grimly awaiting Peter's eventual crash into a wall or furniture, but he didn't have the heart to stop him.

Peter held his hand up in front of his face as if holding a microphone, and sang, "Just take those old records off the shelf, I'll sit and listen to 'em by myself! Today's music ain't got the same soul, I like playin' old time rock n' roll!" He slid across the floor again with a flourish, skidding to a stop next to Rocket.

"What the hell are you doing?" Rocket asked, looking up to see Peter grinning from ear to ear. 

"Risky Business!" Peter crowed, then leaned in and whispered conspiratorially to Rocket. "It's a movie. I saw it one night at Grandpa's house, on HBO, when Grandpa fell asleep early. I wasn't 'sposed to, 'cause it's kinda dirty. There's _sex stuff_."

"Uh-huh," Rocket said awkwardly. 

"But the dancing was cool," Peter said, sitting down on the floor criss-cross-applesauce to watch as Rocket sliced Gamora's old pants, already shortened for Peter's height, up both sides, removing a panel of material from both legs.

"You still dance a lot when you're an adult," he said absently, concentrating on his work. "You play your mixtape for us all the time."

Rocket pulled out a roll of red perma-bond tape and folded the open sides of the pants-legs closed, then sealed the seam with the tape. It gave the effect of a single red stripe up both sides of the pants. He motioned for Peter to try them on, and once he did, took a stapler and folded the waist over to fit Peter's size, stapling it down and then covering the staples on both sides of the cloth with a piece of tape.

Peter held his too-long t-shirt up so that he could see the pants, admiring them from every angle he could see. "I look like Han Solo!" he said excitedly. "Thanks, Rocket!"

Rocket had no idea who or what a 'Han Solo' was, but if it pleased Peter, he didn't care. He was perfectly aware that this was exactly the wrong tactic to take with a small child, but couldn't be too bothered. Part of him wanted to spoil Peter as much as possible, to make up for the actual childhood he'd had, another part was convinced that he would have to give child-Peter up soon anyway, and wanted to spoil him because he would miss little Peter when he was gone, and yet another part just wanted to make whichever version of Peter he was dealing with happy. The last reason was completely unfamiliar to him; he had never really had to consider anyone but himself and Groot before, and Groot was easy: water, sunlight, let him spend time in a forest every once in a while, bam -- taken care of.

 _I'm so screwed_ , he thought again. This kid, this fucking kid, was _ruining_ him. He'd never thought past the next heist or bounty, never envisioned himself involved with humies like this, and now he was Peter's permanent babysitter, until and unless they could get this reversed. He didn't think of himself as a parent to Peter -- he thought it might be because he knew the adult Peter, and had been his friend for so long now. Peter was still his friend as child, but on a different level. When he looked at the kid, he saw the man, too, and missed him. More than he had expected to.

He pictured sitting down with adult Peter when this was all over and talking about it, and was upset to find that in his imagined conversation, he missed the constant physical affection that little Peter lavished on him. Peter hugged him constantly, curled up next to him when they sat anywhere, and used Rocket as a security blanket. He imagined adult Peter treating him the same way, and it was a lovely thought. It also hurt intensely.

Peter was still running around, playing happily by himself, but now his play was interspersed with more "pew pew" noises again, as Peter pretended to shoot bad guys, and occasionally called for someone named 'Chewie' to cover him, or fly faster. It was _fricking adorable_. Peter stopped running and shouting when he caught Rocket watching him, and ran over to hug Rocket before running off again, yelling about the trash compactors on the detention level. Again Rocket had no clue what he was talking about, but let him play however he wished.

He knew he was spoiling Peter. Not just spoiling Peter; he was spoiling himself. _Don't get used to this_ , he counseled himself, _because it won't last_. 

As long as it did, however, he was going to let Peter do anything he wanted. The kid deserved that, at least. As Peter continued tiring himself out, Rocket turned his thoughts to how he could modify Peter's old jet boots for his new self, or even better, build him a new set. A safer set, if he could possibly manage it somehow, but the idea of Peter's shrilly overwhelmed joy when he got to play with _actual jet boots_ was too tempting. "I'm so screwed," he muttered, and had never been more pleased.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Little Peter's good Southern manners are how I was raised. I refused to call my adult cousins by their first names, and insisted upon calling them "Mr. Floyd" or "Miss Alice." 
> 
> "Risky Business" (released in 1983) seems like just the kind of thing kid!Peter would have enjoyed watching on the sly, and I knew he would love [the Tom Cruise dancing scene](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUj79ScZJTo), which at his age was probably the only part that really made an impression.
> 
> Of course Peter loves "Star Wars," and Han would obviously be his fave character.


	3. Peter Discovers His Rebellious Stage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "They're gonna make me a grown-up again," Peter said miserably from behind the door. Rocket was startled; he hadn't realized Peter hated the idea this much. Every once in a while, over the last three days of their journey to the Xandarian system, he would ask Rocket for reassurance that Rocket would still be his best friend when he was grown up again. Rocket always told him yes, of course, but Peter fretted about it anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains kid!Peter expressing his childish crush on Rocket in innocent, age-appropriate terms. If you would find this uncomfortable, I'm not really sure why you're three chapters into this fic, bless your heart. But I thought I would warn ya, to be fair. Also, this is the second chapter I've written and posted today. Can't stop, won't stop.

Rocket should have known that Peter's calm acceptance of his new situation wouldn't last.

"No!" Peter screamed shrilly from behind the closed and locked door of his quarters. "I don't wanna go! You can't make me!" 

"Peter," Rocket said with false cheer, hoping a different tactic would change this intolerable situation. "There's a lot of cool stuff to see on Xandar. Don't you wanna see a whole new planet? We can go to the park or somethin', I don't know." He glanced at Gamora, standing to one side of him, and Drax on the other. Gamora shrugged uncomfortably. She would probably be happier to be in battle against overwhelming odds, said the look on her face, rather than here listening to Peter throw a tantrum. Drax was frowning as he listened.

"They're gonna make me a grown-up again," Peter said miserably from behind the door. Rocket was startled; he hadn't realized Peter hated the idea this much. Every once in a while, over the last three days of their journey to the Xandarian system, he would ask Rocket for reassurance that Rocket would still be his best friend when he was grown up again. Rocket always told him yes, of course, but Peter fretted about it anyway.

Drax caught Gamora's and Rocket's attention, and then spoke firmly through the door: "Peter, we wish to be sure that you are well. If you are able to be safely restored to adulthood, then we will discuss it before doing so. If not, we wish for you to be safe and healthy as you are. Now, open this door, please." His tone was firm; not angry, not pleading, but stating the facts.

Rocket was struck with a little bit of awe when the door opened and Peter stood there, head hung down and his eyes red-rimmed from weeping -- this was the most impressive thing he'd ever seen Drax do, as long as he'd known him. Forget fighting his way through a hundred foes single-handedly; he got _ten-year-old Peter Quill_ to stop throwing a tantrum. Score one for experience as an actual parent.

His own plan of last resort had been to offer Peter the mini-sized jet boots he'd been tinkering with, and had been holding back on giving him until they reached Xandar, if he would stop screaming and open the door -- he figured letting the little lunatic try them planetside, with soft grass and dirt and immediate medical help available, was probably the best plan. Giving in to a shrieking, angry ten-year-old was probably setting a terrible precedent, but he was desperate to soothe Peter somehow. Bless Drax for stepping in.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Drax," Peter said now, the perfect picture of abject guilt. 

Now that Peter was no longer screaming like a horde of the damned, Gamora felt confident enough to step up. "Come up to the galley and we will discuss your behavior," she said, just as firmly as Drax. Rocket was even more impressed. Her training was for stabbing people in the face when they caused problems, not inviting them to a calm discussion of the shit they just pulled. Peter walked out into the corridor and preceded them all up the stairs to the main deck, walking as if he expected to be executed when he got there.

"That was _awesome_ ," Rocket whispered to Drax and Gamora, before following Peter up the stairs. When he joined Peter in the galley, he was sitting at the table, arms crossed at the elbows on the table's surface and his chin on his forearms. 

"I'm sorry I yelled, Rocket," Peter said. "But I don't wanna be grown up again."

"Why not, kiddo?" Rocket asked, sitting down next to him as Drax and Gamora entered the far end of the cabin.

"Just don't. I don't wanna talk about it in front of them, okay?"

"Any reason why?"

"It's private. My mom always said you don't haveta talk about private stuff unless you want to. I just don't wanna talk to _them_ about it."

"Will you talk to me about it, later?" Rocket asked, unsure if it was the right thing to say.

"Yeah," Peter said, looking a little relieved. It had been the right thing, apparently. Rocket couldn't, for the life of him, understand why this version of Peter was so trusting and, yes, loving toward him. Grown-up Peter was his friend, a good one, and treated him with respect and valued him, but Peter as a child had loved and doted on Rocket from the moment he'd laid eyes on him in the maintenance shaft. He didn't understand why, but Rocket treasured that all the same.

When Drax and Gamora joined them at the table, Peter sighed and sat up straight. Drax fixed him with a serious look and said, "Would you tell us why you do not wish to be an adult again?"

"I just don't want to be," he said, and shot Rocket a beseeching look.

Rocket took the hint. "He says his reasons are private, but he'll talk to me about it."

Gamora and Drax traded puzzled looks. "Will you at least consent to go down to the city, and be examined by a physician? We need to know, at least, what has happened to you and if you are in any further danger," Drax said.

Peter sighed unhappily, giving Rocket another of those pleading looks, and then said, almost too low to hear, "I guess."

"You guess?" Gamora prompted gently.

"Yes, ma'am, I'll go," Peter said, and Gamora smiled a little at being called _ma'am_. "May I please go to my room till we have to leave?"

All three adults traded puzzled looks this time. Peter was sending _himself_ to his room.

"Go on, little dude. I'll come down in a while," Rocket said, and Peter trudged away from the table and disappeared down the stairs. "What the _hell_ \--?" Rocket said as soon as he was out of sight. "I didn't think he was that upset about it."

"Do you think he will tell you why?" Gamora asked, looking after Peter even though he was long gone.

"Yeah? I dunno why, but he trusts me."

Drax was looking at him with amusement. "I believe that little Peter is quite fond of you," he said. "In fact, I believe it may be what Peter has referred to as a 'crush.'" Drax was quite proud of himself for understanding that one, Rocket knew. 

"What? You're crazy, he's a little kid!"

"Remember that I was a father once," Drax said, a touch of grief in his voice. "The age that Peter is, if his kind's offspring are anything like mine, is the age when children begin to understand the idea of love. My daughter would fix on and fuss over one schoolmate or another, and it was an innocent, sweet thing to see. Allow Peter his 'crush,' do not stifle his feelings. Let him see that you accept that he feels this way, and leave it at that." Drax nodded once, and then got up from the table and strode from the room, as if he needed more space to remember his little girl.

Rocket swallowed hard, around a lump in his throat he would never, ever admit to, and looked up to see Gamora watching him, a kind look in her eyes. "I agree with Drax. If all goes well, Peter may soon be returned to his true age. Perhaps you and he will have much to discuss then. Go and find out what is troubling him now." She left the table as well.

Rocket sat there for a while longer, thinking. If he put all the clues together, then yes, it was probably true. Peter was a little kid, but he wasn't _that_ little. He seemed to be able to flip-flop back and forth between complete innocence and telling some of the filthiest dick jokes that even Rocket had ever heard. It was uncomfortable to think about this version of Peter feeling this way about him; it occurred to him almost immediately on the heels of that thought that he would be thrilled if grown-up Peter felt the same. That was a shocking idea. He had never had such a thought about a human before. He realized that he was treading into some seriously fucked-up ground here, and wished Drax had never opened his big stupid blue mouth. Now he would be scrutinizing Peter's behavior, and it irritated him.

 _Peter deserves better than me, for even thinking like that_ , he thought, and shaking off as much of his previous preoccupations as he could, went to find Peter.

=====

Peter didn't answer when he knocked, so he pushed the door open slightly -- Peter, as an adult, often didn't answer when someone knocked on his cabin door because he had his headphones on. When Rocket peeked inside, he was right. Peter was lying on his back on his bunk, eyes closed, listening to music. He could hear the faint, tinny sound of "O-o-h Child," the song Peter had saved the galaxy with, filtering softly from the foam pads over Peter's ears. Rocket tapped the foot of the bunk gently, as he had done hundreds of times before, and Peter startled a little, sitting up and taking the headphones off.

"Feel like talkin'?" Rocket asked. He sat down by Peter's feet as Peter pushed himself up to sit at the head of the bunk.

"Yeah."

"So why don't you wanna be a grown-up again, Peter?" he asked, as kindly and as neutrally as he could.

Peter was blushing before he even spoke. "You," he said in a very quiet voice.

"Me? Why me?"

"I remember a little about bein' a grown-up, and I know if I'm big again, it won't be the same."

"You remember? I thought you said all you remembered was waking up in your quarters," Rocket said, beginning to feel uneasy.

"Mostly stuff about you. Like, when I'm big again, you won't let me hug you and stuff. I don't ever remember doing that when I was grown-up."

"You can still hug me all you want when you're full size again, squirt," Rocket said, and it was true. If Peter had tried to hug him before, he would have slugged him on instinct. Now the idea of full-grown Peter hugging him sounded like the best thing in the universe.

"I like when you call me stuff like that, and you won't do that, either. I know it," Peter said, sounding bereft.

"Baby boo, I'll call you anything you want when you're big again. Anything, no matter how dumb it makes me sound. Snookums, honey bunny, puddin' --" He was prepared to go on, but Peter at least cracked a little bit of a smile, then sobered again just as quickly.

"That's not all, though," Peter said. "It's that boys are supposed to want to marry girls when they grow up."

"What does that have to do with anything?" Rocket asked. 

"If I grow up, I won't be around you all the time, and I won't be able to...to get married to you either."

"You want to marry me when you grow up," Rocket repeated slowly, making sure he was understanding Peter correctly.

"I know it's wrong," Peter said miserably, as if he were waiting for Rocket to be furious with him, and Rocket wondered just what the _hell_ was going on on that fucking planet that a little kid had worries like that.

"Says who?" Rocket asked him.

" _Everybody_ ," Peter said, as if he was reminding Rocket that space was big.

"Not out here," Rocket said firmly. "That's just Terran bullshit. Out here you do what you want, as long as you don't hurt anybody."

"So if I did grow up, we could get married?"

"Why do you want to marry me, kiddo?" Rocket asked, exasperated. Maybe Peter misunderstood what being married was? It was the only explanation Rocket could wrap his mind around.

"Because you're my best friend."

"That's not what being married is, kid." Part of him was a little disappointed. Having adult Peter make the same statement would still blow his mind, but it would be an entirely different thing with a Peter that understood what he was asking for, not a lonely, motherless child who wanted a friend.

"Not just that. I remember, when I was grown up, I liked you. I mean, like _that_. But I never said nothin' about it. I was scared you didn't like me. If I grow up again, I still won't say anything, and I won't even get to be around you all the time either, so I don't wanna be grown-up."

Rocket thought for a moment, carefully, and then said, "If they tell us you can be a grown-up again without hurting you, will you agree to do it, if I promise we can talk about this again when you're an adult?"

"Why talk about it again?" Peter asked. 

"Because once you're a grown-up again, we can talk about -- about if you feel the same way."

"You mean, like get married after all?"

Rocket heard the words coming out of his mouth from a distance, because he was having a hard time processing that his life -- his life, the one where he was a one-of-a-kind cybernetic experimental animal who walked on two legs, talked, and built things that could blow up moons, that life -- could possibly be this strange. "Yes, we can talk about it."

"Okay," Peter said shyly, and scooted over on the bed to sit against Rocket's side. His hug was still as innocent as ever, but he did lean down and place a quick kiss on Rocket's cheek. "It might be a good thing, to be a grown-up again. Sometimes I think about stuff that I don't really _get_."

"Uh, we can talk about that too, after you're big." Thinking that this conversation was now way above his paygrade, he hugged Peter and got up, moving to the door. "I'm gonna go see how close we are to landing, okay? I'll come get you when it's time."

"Okay," Peter agreed, and slid back down on the bunk, putting his headphones back on.

Rocket carefully closed the door behind himself and walked up to the cockpit, where Drax and Gamora were prepping the ship for landing. "So, I think I just got engaged," he said, throwing himself into the central beam seat. 

" _What?_ " Gamora asked, craning her head around the back of the pilot's chair.

"The reason he didn't want to be an adult again was me. He thought if he went back to being a grown-up, I wouldn't spend as much time with him. And then he said he liked me, like liked me, liked me, even when he was grown-up, and then somehow I agreed to talk about getting married when he's an adult again and I don't really know what the hell is going on anymore."

"Congratulations," Drax said. They were passing into the atmosphere now, the backsplash of flame painting the interior of the cockpit in reds and oranges.

"Thanks. You were right, I guess."

"We will arrive at the skydock in five minutes, Rocket. Are you ready for this?" Gamora asked, concerned about her friend.

"Yeah. I mean, I have no idea how I feel about any of this, but since I just gave my hand in fuckin' marriage to get him to go see the goddamn doctor and hopefully become an adult again, we might as well go."

Gamora and Drax had the landing under control, so Rocket watched the viewscreen clear from orange to the blue skies of Xandar. He got up, steeling himself to deal with Peter, and went to fetch his, what -- ten-year-old fiancee? Good _god_ \-- for a trip planetside.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No seriously, I've written so fucking much today, oh my god. I have some stressful situations going on right now, and this morning, to distract myself, I sat down and wrote chapter 2 from 7AM to 11AM without eating breakfast, which is bad news bears when you are a Type 2 Diabetic. So what did I do? After I fed myself and successfully not passed out a bunch of times, I wrote chapter 3. I hope it isn't crap. I feel like goddamn Hemingway or something, so it's probably crap.


	4. Not Picking Out China Patterns

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I'm gonna be dumb when I'm big again, so don't let me be. Make me talk about it, okay?" Peter said with sudden force, his eyes hard and bright. "I may not understand all of it, but the stuff grown-up me thought about you was real important, so make him talk to you. Okay?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for your patience with me and my many unfinished series. There's more to come of this story, so please keep on keeping on with me!

Rocket began to wish he'd never gotten Peter to agree to come down planetside about ten minutes into the ordeal, when Peter realized that the building they were entering was a hospital. It all went to shit from there. Only Gamora's quick thinking and augmented reflexes stopped Peter when he tried to escape the three adults and one flora colossi shepherding him along. Her arm struck out like a snake and she had Peter by the ear before he could get more than three steps. She slung Peter up into a bear hug, facing outward against her chest, and Rocket would swear that he saw actual fear on the face of the most deadly woman in the galaxy at the ferocity with which Peter fought and clawed to get down, screaming at almost inaudible heights of the scale. It took Drax telling Peter that if he refused to go inside, he would be carried like an infant in Drax's arms and would be unable to walk next to Rocket and hold his hand, to stop Peter's screaming and struggling.

That threat worked, and Peter slumped in the circle of Gamora's arms, submitting almost instantly. "Are you done making a spectacle of yourself, Peter?" she asked, giving him a little squeeze, and he nodded, panting harshly. They had all known that asking Peter to go into a hospital was likely to set him off -- Rocket had explained to the others what little he had gleaned from the things Peter had told him about his mother's death. Add to that his obvious anxiety and opposition to the idea of becoming an adult again, and it was a recipe for unpleasantness for everyone involved. They managed to get Peter inside, him holding Rocket's hand tightly and looking sick and grief-stricken, and Rocket at his side and looking no better than Peter did. Rocket couldn't bear to even look at the kid, and his guilt was a ravenous thing, eating him alive from the inside out like acid.

Some of Rocket's immense, acidic guilt left him once Peter was examined, and they found out what had actually happened, and been happening, to him: the weapon that Peter had been struck with was designed to disrupt DNA replication. If any of the others had been hit, they would have died within hours, of symptoms resembling severe radiation poisoning. Only the influence of Peter's celestial parentage saved him, allowing his body to essentially rewind his DNA to a previous, healthy state, free of as many of the DNA transcription errors that accumulate over the course of a lifetime as possible. He would begin to age at an accelerated rate soon, his body repairing itself and returning him to his true age. He would again have access to his adult memories, knowledge, and personality, but only after a month or so of painful, bone-cracking, body-warping growth.

The process could be accelerated by putting Peter into stasis for a few days, while bombarding his body with treatments to encourage cell replication. While in stasis, he would feel no pain from the accelerated aging process; for him, he would go to sleep as a child, and wake as a man.

The Nova doctors only had to be threatened once to get them to leave, so that Rocket could speak to Peter alone -- his reputation for remorseless, savage biting must be getting around. When the door was shut behind the last of their navy blue scrubs and white coats, Rocket sat down next to Peter on the consulting room's sofa, both of them with their feet swinging clear of the floor.

"Peter," Rocket started to say, and Peter squeezed his hand a little and cut him off.

"I know. I don't want to, even if it's gonna hurt to grow up the long way, 'cause I know everything will be different when I wake up." He looked up at Rocket, and his face was solemn. "But I know you want me to do it, and I -- just promise you'll still be my best friend, after, okay?"

Rocket nodded, feeling his eyes sting. "I will always be your best friend, baby boo. Promise."

"I'm gonna be dumb when I'm big again, so don't let me be. Make me talk about it, okay?" Peter said with sudden force, his eyes hard and bright. "I may not understand all of it, but the stuff grown-up me thought about you was real important, so make him talk to you. Okay?"

"Okay, I will. I promise."

"Can we go ahead and get them to do it now, before I get too scared?" Peter said in a small voice, and the bravery it took for him to say it astounded Rocket. He hugged him tightly for a second, and then got up to go to the door.

"What did he say?" Gamora demanded as soon as she saw Rocket opening the door. She and Drax had been standing guard, shoulder to shoulder, outside the consulting room door, intending that Rocket and Peter should be able to talk privately for as long as necessary, without the interference of the doctors and technicians hovering on the other side of the hall.

"Tell them to start setting it up. He wants to do it right away, get it over with."

"Is he sure?" Drax asked.

"I think so. Let's just do it, okay? I can't stand to keep drawing this out," Rocket said tiredly, and the other two nodded.

=====

It took three days for Peter to heal completely and return to his previous state. Rocket had been allowed to see him, as he was sedated for stasis, and Peter had asked, "You won't leave if I go to sleep?"

"I won't, I promise," Rocket had told him, finding himself in the deep end of the pool again and making promises to a scared little boy. This was one that he was not allowed to keep, as Peter would be in an isolation tank, but again, it only took one threat for Rocket to get his way and be allowed to sit by Peter's recovery room bed as he woke up, this time as a man.

"Hey," said a deep, weirdly unfamilar voice, and Rocket looked up from the tablet he'd been holding, setting it aside to look Peter over as he shifted in bed, testing his new muscle and bone. He had been overwhelmed, when they had first brought Peter in, to suddenly see a grown man in place of the little boy. He had simply sat and stared for a long while, as if coaxing his eyes into making sense of Peter all over again. Eventually the sense of disjointment and unreality had faded, and it was just Peter, sleeping easily. 

"Hey, baby boo," Rocket answered, and climbed up to sit on the bed by Peter's waist.

"You're still gonna call me that?" Peter said, squinting at him from the head of the bed.

"Promised little you I would. Do you remember all of it?" Rocket asked carefully.

"Yeah. I remember."

"Do you remember the talk you wanted to have?"

"Yeah," Peter said, shifting again, this time as if he was nervous, uncomfortable. "I'm sorry about...all that. Little me, he didn't have a filter, you know? He didn't get what was okay to say and what wasn't."

Rocket turned so that he was facing Peter full-on. "He said you'd be stupid about this as a grown-up. Do you want to talk about it, or not? Because now that you're an adult again, I can tell you that I'm up for it if you are. I'd be willing to see what happens. I'm not sayin' I wanna go pick out china patterns or whatever, but I'd be -- willing. To try."

Peter was looking at him, studying him. "You weren't just humoring me so I'd come here to get checked out?"

The way Peter had looked at him, when he was a child, like he was all that mattered in the world, came to him. He wanted this version of Peter to look at him like that, treat him like that, and that made up his mind for him. "I was taking care of little you, but...I fell for _you_ , even though you were gone. I could see this kid, and I would think about who you grew up to be, and it made me miss grown-up you."

"We would be so dumb at this," Peter said after a moment. "If we tried -- we would be terrible. _I_ would be terrible. You know that, right? Little me just spewed out everything I feel because he didn't understand that none of it could ever possibly work!" 

"Fuck this," Rocket said, and stalked up to the head of the recovery room bed to push his way into Peter's arms, resentfully curling up against him. "You're a bigger whiny goddamn baby as a grown-up. Shut up for a second, will ya?"

Peter did, slowly reaching to put his arms around Rocket, and after a little shifting around to account for Peter's wider chest and longer reach, they were in the same position they had been sleeping in every night for over a week, with Rocket cradled in Peter's arms like a stuffed toy. "There," Rocket said. "And you thought I wouldn't let you hug me anymore. Get fuckin' used to it, baby boo."

Peter laughed against the top of Rocket's head, and he found he liked Peter's light tenor laugh even more than he'd liked little Peter's soprano giggle.

He sobered quickly though, and when he spoke, his breath ruffling Rocket's fur, there was a finality to his voice that Rocket didn't like at all. "It won't work, for all kinds of reasons, Rocket. When I was little, it was like everything was so simple. I like you, I do. If things were different --"

"Little you told me the stuff you thought about me was important," Rocket cut in. "Nobody has ever thought anything about me was important. If I'm that important to you, then I'm gonna be greedy about it. I _want_ to be important to you." The only reason he was saying any of this was because he didn't have to look at Peter while he said it. And because the child Peter had been was so good at getting Rocket to say the things he felt. Little Peter had bled his feelings out into the world without a single reservation, and Rocket had tried to do the same, at least toward the kid, just because he didn't have it in him to deny Peter anything. 

Peter was quiet again, for so long that Rocket was considering getting up and leaving, and finding a good place to be where Peter wasn't. Before he could, he felt Peter's arms tighten around him a little, and Peter said, "When you pulled the cover off the compartment I was in, as soon as I saw you, I was glad. I didn't even know who you were, but I knew you'd take care of me. When you said all that stuff to prove you knew me, and said I was your best friend...Rocket, I never had any friends growing up. Not even as an adult, not really. All the stuff that I feel about you, it does feel important, but...it was more important to me to stay your friend and not fuck things up. Not fuck up with the first real friend I ever had, my best friend."

"So we can't be both? Best friends and -- and whatever?"

"Have you even met me?" Peter asked, incredulous. "Have you been paying attention to how fucked up I am about the people I sleep with? I'm not -- I don't know how to talk to someone five minutes after we finish fucking, much less the next morning. I always bug out as soon as I can, because I just...I'm a con man. I don't do sincere."

"And I'm Mr. Sensitive Feelings? I'm a thug. Until I got mixed up with you, I hurt people for a living. All those bounties I turned over? I sent a lot of folks to prison or execution. Like I was gonna do with you. The only reason I'm talking to you like this now is because little you _asked_ me to. I liked being important to that kid. He didn't care who I was, or what I looked like, and if he was you with no filter between his brain and mouth, then I'm gonna believe him over you."

"You are important to me. I just...didn't know what to do about it."

"Like I do?" 

"This is gonna go great," Peter sighed, resting his cheek against Rocket's head. "Neither of us know what we're doing."

"We'll figure that part out later. Isn't that how you make plans?"

"We're trusting me now? That's a terrible idea."

"Then we'll trust ten-year-old you," Rocket said.

"That's even worse," Peter replied, and Rocket could hear the smile in his voice. 

"He seemed to know what he was talking about."

"Maybe." The cheek resting against the top of Rocket's head rubbed gently between his ears, Peter nuzzling him as they fell silent. "So what do we do now?" Peter said after a long, quiet while.

"You need to rest. Hell, I need to rest. I got so used to having you with me when I slept that I haven't gotten any shut-eye in too long. So sleep. We'll talk later."

Peter snuggled down into the pillow, getting comfortable, and it was the same shrug and wiggle that little-him had curled up next to Rocket with every night, magnified. It was going to be strange, all the same little-boy mannerisms contained in a man that Rocket felt as if he had never met before, and knew better than anyone else.

"So is it going to be the other talk that little me wanted to have?" Peter said, and this time, when he shifted his arms and body against Rocket, it was less innocent.

"The birds and the bees are gonna have to wait until I've had some sleep. But yeah," Rocket said, not really knowing what he was agreeing to this time -- and how did Peter always get him to agree to this shit so easily? He needed to be just as careful of that with grown-up Peter as he was the kid version. "We can talk about it."

"Okay," Peter said, and it was familiar, if Rocket kept his eyes closed. The sleepy voice, the arms around him, Peter's scent -- only the width and breadth of Peter's chest, the musky edge to his scent that said this was an adult male, only those things were new. It was still Peter, still his friend. He relaxed into it, feeling like Peter was finally home.


End file.
